Marketing for Less: Cost Efficient Marketing Tactics in Tough Times

For the small business owner, these tough economic times are forcing them to take pause. Are they doing everything they can to reach existing and new customers? Perhaps they think they can’t afford to do more. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are many broad-reaching (and free) marketing tools currently available such as Twitter, community Toolbars, Facebook, Ning social networks, blogs, etc. that enable companies to market to the masses, with a personal touch - and at little to no cost. Gone are the days of massive direct mail - with both its expense and impersonal approach. These new technologies are useful in a genuine, approachable and real way and they make a direct connection between a company and its users.

Included below are several examples of some free social networking tools that any small business can adopt with ease. Read on to learn how some organizations are cross-pollinating their online marketing efforts and connecting with more customers in more meaningful ways.

Community Toolbars

Services such as Conduit’s marketing platform enable anyone to build a community toolbar at no charge. These branded toolbars work in any web browser and can be equipped with pretty much anything you can put on a website: software/applications, RSS Feeds, video, chat, Twitter gadgets, games, radio, and more. Just like the big guys, such as Google and Yahoo, any web publisher can now put their brand right in the browser, creating a very persistent reminder and offering a major convenience for users.

These are different than the iFrame toolbars, such as those deployed by Facebook, Digg and YouTube. Framing (”wrapping” other people’s content) has been criticized for entrapping visitors and hijacking websites. In short, iFraming has some good benefits, such as allowing for easy content sharing, but mostly the benefits are for the framer and they create a lot of pain points for users and other site owners. Community toolbars, however, have been very successful for thousands of publishers and millions of users because they are truly convenient, but not intrusive.

Facebook Groups

By setting up a Facebook Group, organizations can further promote brand presence, share news and events with the group members and also offer a place for discussions. There are now thousands of applications available on Facebook that make it easy to go “viral” with your stuff.

Twitter

Recently, SMBCEO covered Twitter in an article called Free Twitter Buttons and Icons. For some organizations, Twitter is a great opportunity to have one-to-one conversations with followers. It’s also a means to publicize specials or promotions and drive people to a company website or blog or another online presence.

Ning

Ning lets you create social networks. The service is completely free and anyone can create a customized social network of their own. Social networks are perfect for communities that want a lot of interaction. Like Facebook, there are also thousands of applications available on the Ning platform that can help you share content and applications among users.

These are just a few of the many social networking tools available to anyone and everyone. Smart small businesses aren’t doing away with their marketing initiatives, they are just thinking differently about them now. Rather than waiting for customers to come to you, using social networking tools provides a means to go where your customers are and actively engage them. Whether it’s through the creation of your own social networking site using Ning, setting up a Facebook Group, creating a branded community toolbar, using Twitter or a combination of all, you can make a big impact with little to no budget. Get started now!